Certain beverage preparation machines use capsules containing ingredients to be extracted or to be dissolved; for other machines, the ingredients are stored and dosed automatically in the machine or else are added at the time of preparation of the drink.
Various beverage machines, such as coffee machines, are arranged to circulate liquid, usually water, from a water reservoir that is cold or heated by heating means, to a mixing or infusion chamber where the beverage is actually prepared by exposing the circulating liquid to a bulk or pre-packaged ingredient, for instance within a capsule. From this chamber, the prepared beverage is usually guided to a beverage dispensing area, for instance to a beverage outlet located above a cup or mug support area comprised or associated with the beverage machine. During or after the preparation process, used ingredients and/or their packaging is evacuated to a collection receptacle.
Whenever, the liquid reservoir is empty or the collection receptacle is full, the user must refill the reservoir or empty the receptacle, respectively, in order to be able to prepare a further beverage.
Used capsules may be collected in a machine's used capsule receptacle for instance as mentioned in EP 1 731 065. Typically, the capsule receptacle is located underneath the infusion or mixing chamber so that the capsules may fall by gravity into the receptacle upon extraction. The receptacle has to be emptied by the user when full. The receptacle may be a drawer-type removable receptacle located in a seat of the beverage preparation machine. The used capsule receptacle may be slid in and out of the machine's housing.
For allowing the user to interact with such machines, for providing operation instructions to the machine or obtaining feed-back therefrom, various systems have been disclosed in the art, for instance as mentioned in the following references: AT 410 377, CH 682 798, DE 29 353, DE 20 2006 019 039, EP 1 448 084, EP 1 676 509, EP 1 707 088, EP 08 155 851.2, FR 2 624 844, GB 2 397 510, U.S. Pat. No. 4,253,385, U.S. Pat. No. 4,377,049, U.S. Pat. No. 4,458,735, U.S. Pat. No. 4,554,419, U.S. Pat. No. 4,767,632, U.S. Pat. No. 4,954,697, U.S. Pat. No. 5,312,020, U.S. Pat. No. 5,335,705, U.S. Pat. No. 5,372,061, U.S. Pat. No. 5,375,508, U.S. Pat. No. 5,645,230, U.S. Pat. No. 5,731,981, U.S. Pat. No. 5,836,236, U.S. Pat. No. 5,927,553, U.S. Pat. No. 5,959,869, U.S. Pat. No. 6,182,555, U.S. Pat. No. 6,354,341, U.S. Pat. No. 6,759,072, U.S. Pat. No. 7,028,603, U.S. Pat. No. 7,270,050, U.S. Pat. No. 7,279,660, U.S. Pat. No. 7,350,455, US 2007/0157820, WO 97/25634, WO 99/50172, WO 03/039309, WO 2004/030435, WO 2004/030438, WO 2006/063645, WO 2006/082064, WO 2006/090183, WO 2007/003062, WO 2007/003990, WO 2008/104751 and PCT/EP08/054,858.
In particular, U.S. Pat. No. 4,767,632 discloses a beverage machine with a display adapted to display an error message, such as “COFFEE MILL DEFECTIVE”, “RESERVOIR EMPTY”, “WATER TANK EMPTY” or “PUMP DEFECTIVE”. EP 1 707 088 discloses a coffee machine having a display or an indicator lamp to indicate that a receptacle for collecting brewed coffee is full and must be emptied. GB 2 397 510 discloses a coffee machine with a series of indicator LEDs, one of which may be used to indicate a low water level in the machine's tank. A similar interface arrangement is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,836,236 and in WO 2008/104751.
There is still a need to optimise the servicing by the user of the beverage preparation machine.